


Roadside heartache

by lemonimpact



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Australia, Bittersweet, Canon Compliant, Existential Angst, M/M, Road Trips, Yearning, but also strangely hopeful, this is like...a bit unhinged
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-06
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:14:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27417835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemonimpact/pseuds/lemonimpact
Summary: The windows are rolled down, so the wind blows the hair away from Felix's face and exposes his forehead dotted with sweat and acne scars. He’s leisurely holding onto the roof handle with his hand and the position in which he finds himself lowers the loose collar of his stretched out, washing machine-soft white shirt. It slips down and Chris can see his collarbones, a small black tattoo and a purple hickey, left by someone who wasn’t Chris. When he leans over to change the volume setting on the radio, he smells like a boy and Australian roadside dust. Chris is in love.
Relationships: Bang Chan/Lee Felix
Comments: 18
Kudos: 73





	Roadside heartache

**Author's Note:**

> i don't know what it is about these two men but they drive me insane. anyways.

They barely pass the city of Bollon when the sun starts to set.

Chris missed this, perhaps more than the sum of hundreds many other small things that he left behind in Australia. The candy, the sea, the heat, the people – they made him ache, but not in the way seeing the sun now does. Sun is a strange thing to miss when you can find it anywhere on the planet.

Still, Chris leans down a bit in the driver’s seat in order to observe the disk that stands proud in the middle of the sky. It’s round like an apple, maybe a toddler’s little cheek – something to cherish. The light it emits paints the already orange, dusty roads even more golden, the particles twinkling in the wind like glitter that Felix likes putting under Chris’s eyes when they stop by in a bigger city to indulge in the local party scene. The sun always accompanies them when they do – sets them off for the night and winks goodbye, goodluck, peeking over the edge of the sinking horizon – greets them anew with light when they stumble to their hotel room during early morning hours. Chris likes to think that the sun keeps them safe. Something has to.

The road gets progressively dustier the farther away they get from Bollon. Chris heard that there has been very little rain in the past few weeks, that lakes have dried up and trees have started to wilt. That the temperature got too harsh even for some of the people living in the nearby small towns. At some point Chris thinks he spots a dead mouse somewhere along the side of the road. His chest constricts painfully at the sight. 

The farther they go, the more time passes, too – distance and time are wed together and inseparable in spite of how much Chris wishes they weren’t. How he wishes there were ways to minimize the distance in no time, to build proximity and keep it in a limbo where it won’t end. Sometimes he wishes for thousands of kilometres within seconds, separating him from others. Chris never liked physics and he has an inkling that they have never liked him back either.

The sun is at an eye level now – Chris apologizes in his head when he lowers the sun visor. He wants to keep on looking at the golden light, commit it to memory for when distance keeps him away from homeland, but he would rather not risk getting into a car accident while he and Felix are having their yearly road trip. He can even imagine the headlines: “Two Korean Male Celebrities Found Dead in a Ditch Following a Car Accident - The Driver Was Blinded By Sunlight and Love For His Bandmate”. He snorts at the thought of it.

In the periphery of his vision he can see Felix turn to him and he hears him hum questioningly. 

“Nothing.” Chris answers the unasked question, “Just had a funny thought.”

Chan glances quickly at Felix, who is already staring at him, a tiny smile on his lips. 

“You always have funny thoughts, Chris.” Felix murmurs fondly, his eye corners crinkled from his gentle smile. Chris wishes he could reach out his thumb and caress this place, where happiness is folded into corners of Felix’s youthful face. Maybe he could keep some of it for himself if he did that.

But then Felix reaches over to caress the hair on Chris’ nape and he realizes – he can. He can touch Felix, he can trace his boy’s beautiful skin, he can even kiss it, if he dares. This is why they are here in the first place – to be free, for a little bit. The idea of keeping distance in spite of longing for proximity is so ingrained into his very core that sometimes he forgets. Habits of survival are not easy to shed even in safety, Chris reminds himself, go easy on yourself. It’s okay.

It’s hard to remember when from time to time even just looking at Felix makes something violent happen inside of him. His body at war, all because of a boy. There is a part that screams for closeness, for tender touches and the not so tender ones as well – and there is a part that knows better. Chris tends to listen to that part most of the time. He cherishes it, because it keeps them safe. 

But the first part – ignoring it is next to impossible when sunlight embraces Felix’s face like a lover when he looks out of the window. There is gold on his eyelids. The windows are rolled down, so the wind blows the hair away from his face and exposes his forehead dotted with sweat and acne scars. He’s leisurely holding onto the roof handle with his hand and the position in which he finds himself lowers the loose collar of his stretched out, washing machine-soft white shirt. It slips down and Chris can see his collarbones, a small black tattoo and a purple hickey, left by someone who wasn’t Chris. When he leans over to change the volume setting on the radio, he smells like a boy and Australian roadside dust. Chris is in love.

He _is_ in love, even if they’re not together. The roadtrips aren’t there just so that they can run away and fuck at the other end of the world. Chris cringes at the thought, it feels almost sacrilegious to call their time spent together like that. It’s not that, it’s – closeness. A free pass to experience tenderness and desire in a place where it’s easier to do so. And whether they decide to indulge in these feelings with each other or with nameless lovers from cities that they will never come back to again, well. That’s their call. 

Chris doesn’t blame Felix for spending his nights with others, because he does it, too, sometimes. When for entire years you are busy aching for a man that you can’t have, it feels good to have someone new, something fresh. A reprieve before you come back to the inevitable. 

It doesn’t really change the fact that most of this week is spent together, in each other’s arms. Chris’ hands, that are gripping the steering wheel tightly, tingle with the memory of how Felix’s supple thighs feel gathered together in the grip of his dry hands, how his chest quivers like a bowstring when he is on the brink of orgasm, how heavy Felix’s palm feels pressed to the top knob of Chris’ spine when he takes him. They spend the nights tangled in sheets and days intertwined together still – Felix’s chapped lips along the line of stubble growing on Chris’ jaw, Chris flapping his hands around, laughing, trying to make Felix _stop, dear God, not now_ , because he might just crash the car if he continues. It would be a happy death.

He thinks about how they eat breakfasts at weird, run down restaurants strewn alongside the highway, Felix’s shoulders soft and relaxed, even if there are people around them. He loosens up even further when Chris slithers his hand across the table to grip Felix’s one and swipe his thumb over his skin lazily like a windshield wiper. It’s like an antithesis of their entire lives. He smiles and they just observe each other until the food is brought to their table. When they eat, their ankles are crossed together under the table like a pinky promise.

Even when they’re at clubs and they’re nameless and surrounded by lights and beautiful strangers who want them – it still feels like something monumental ties them together. Chris dances with some of the clubgoers, but it doesn’t matter when at the end of the night he is tugged back to Felix’s side anyways. Felix’s hand is in Chris’ back pocket as they come back to their rented room and he feels like a winner. He gets to take his sun back home with him. He gets to sleep in the same bed and kiss him good morning. He gets to live, for a few days. It has to be enough. Even if it wasn’t – Chris would still be grateful.

When they’ll be back to being stars, idols, musicians, whatever – it won’t be safe to love Felix again, it won’t be smart. But he looks ahead, at the sun liquidating into nothingness, orange getting purple getting dark, and trusts the golden disk to keep Felix warm when Chris’ hands can’t.

They drive off into the sunset.

**Author's Note:**

> hello, this is something short that i just had to write to get all this gross yearning out of my system while i'm writing my werewolf skz au. i really hope you enjoyed it, feel free to leave kudos and comments if you did! big thanks to kam for brainstorming a lot of chanlix thoughts with me that lead to me being a tad unhinged and to my lovely yuri for being as supportive as ever<3
> 
> follow me on twitter, i'd die for some chanlix mutuals!! muah  
> [@lemonimpact](https://twitter.com/lemonimpact)


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